


The Long-Awaited Sequel

by Tolpen



Series: It's Quiet In Basketville [2]
Category: Discworld - Terry Pratchett
Genre: Also Only Implied And Very Brief, Bodyswap, Constantin Meserole, Dogs, Established Relationship, Garden Is Important, Helen Foxglove, I love them both by the way, July Mendahorse being simply decently awesome, Like Past Torture, Lucius "Lus Twinkle" Twinkle-Clement-Monger, M/M, Not really addressed trauma, Or sex, Poetry, Retirement, Retirement To Countryside Trope Abuse, Rosa Linnah Stilltoe breaking gender roles on both sides, Side Characters' Backstories, domestic life, implied stuff, is the Czech anarchistic poetry showing too much here, silence is a language
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-21
Updated: 2018-09-07
Packaged: 2019-06-14 03:00:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 21,625
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15379242
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tolpen/pseuds/Tolpen
Summary: Constantin Meserole visits his cousin for the spring break. Downey and Vetinari find out that migraines should be treated, and that there is an excellent oportunisty to put Constantin's life together at least a little bit. Oh, and on Thursday there is a Parents and Friends of School Association meeting.





	1. The Mind

It's the beginning of December and this far Rimwards, nearly to the borders with Quirm, it's as if the Hell has frozen over. Snow is falling to the ground like angels from their grace. Late morning, the sky is slowly turning dark purple. There is sun somewhere behind the heavy clouds. The cherry trees are black and white with snow. Chilly but weak wind blows.

Vetinari closes the door behind himself, dusts his shoes and shoulders. Inside the house it is warm, but dark. Nobody has bothered to light a candle. He takes off his coat, takes his shoes off the lazy way of toeing out of them, because he has hands full of post. It's important to get the post as fas as possible in winter. The mailbox isn't snow-proof and Vetinari has found his correspondence completely ruined on more than one occasion.

Walking thorough the dark house feels like sneaking, although he isn't sneaking at all. He throws a log to keep into the hearth and then walks upstairs. With a quiet creak of the door he slips into the bedroom, which squeezed between the library and the herbarium.

Downey has once asked: 'Where in Blind Io's name have you dug up that word herbarium anyway?'

'In _The Times_ four years ago,' Vetinari has answered and scribbled into the crossword.

He throws the packet of letters at the night stand and slips into the covers. The bed creaks. A pair of hands reaches out for him and pulls him close, there is a kiss on the back of his neck. It's all so soft. Domestic. In a way it doesn't feel real. In a way it does seem more real than anything.

'Glad you're back,' Downey mumbles into Vetinari's shoulder. That man is a lot of warmth and cuddles. Especially in winter.

Vetinari only chuckles: 'I didn't go anywhere. Only to get the post, dear.'

'Yea. But I was giving it four more minutes with you gone until I'd have to get up and make breakfast. And now you're back, so I don't have to.'

'Mmm.' Vetinari thinks about it for a while. 'What about a breakfast to bed, then?'

'I ain't getting up, Havelock.'

'Somebody has to walk the dogs, anyway.'

 _'That_ can wait.'

'Hey, hey, keep your hands to yourself.' In spite of the statement, Vetinari doesn't pull away. Happiness can be a lot of things. A retired Master of Assassins messing up your hair and squeezing your buttocks, for instance. Or, a mere seconds later, when half a dozen of large wolfhounds realize they are cold and paid not enough attention, so they all crawl into your bed and dig beneath your duvets.

Both men laugh and poor Emma barks in confusion.

The always present and slippery now moves an hour and half forward. There is some light outside, but not much, because the clouds don't want to let it touch the ground, just like a heavy cream doesn't want the spoonful of honey you added in the last minute before serving to reach the porridge, unless you stir it up a bit. The strong wind is doing it's best to stir the clouds, but there are too many clouds for at least a bit of the sky and sunlight to appear.

It's a bit gloomy. Winters love to be gloomy, especially the week after the Crueltide. However, neither Vetinari nor Downey light a candle as they go thorough their post and leftover breakfast coffee. There is still a handful of unopened envelopes on the table. Downey is a bit of a slow reader.

They both get a lot of post. Vetinari isn't much surprised by it. He likes to be informed, so people inform him. He has friends abroad, mainly in Überwald, who like to keep in touch. And of course, somebody has to take care of the Bank of Genua, isn't it so?

Downey, that is a whole different story. He hasn't expected to receive any letters, ever, or if some, maybe one or two calls for help from Pteppicymon. Much to the surprise of both, the current Head of the Assassins' Guild and Academy had to write him only as much as an invitation to the annual Graduation Ball, which Downey attended to.

Even more surprising, however, has been the rest of the letters, and even nowadays, Downey is baffled by the amount of post he gets. It's all from pupils and students, some of them he taught, some of them not, quite a number he cannot even connect names to faces.

Those letters vary in theme. There are letters who rely on his expertise with poisons to help the poor student with a thesis. There are driven poisoners who would love to continue in Downey's numerous researches – No, they couldn't, Downey is still working on them, keep your gloved hands away, are you even wearing safety goggles?

Vast majority of them is personal correspondence from his former students and pupils. Usually pointless and sometimes informative chatter. Twinklemon's adventures with the binocular microscope. Stilltoe excitedly pursing her dream career of a professional ballerina despite her mother wishes. Aconite begging Lord Downey to return and take back over the Poison class, because, sir, Mericet is being unreasonable and old dusty hag!

Vetinari wouldn't say it out loud, but he loves to watch Downey as he makes it thorough the daily mail. It softens him in a way. The retired Patrician considers himself quite an expert when it comes to reading people, and used to claim that he had seen everything there could be to a person. Now he admits that he has been wrong, for all the time he has been alive it hasn't come to his mind that there could be a person who has never received any personal correspondence. Or that somebody could be so happy about other people writing letters to him. On the list of things that are happiness, Havelock Vetinari adds personal correspondence.

Downey can be soft even when he is clearly worried, that is a very interesting thing about him. He can feel on multiple levels, more things at a time, he can recognize each feeling and put it on a separate platform and deal with it on its own. He is happy he got a letter and he is soft because of it. He is unhappy with whatever it is written in the letter, and he is worried because of it. What a wonderful skill to have, feeling on multiple levels, Vetinari thinks.

'Havelock, what would you say about Constantin coming over for the spring break?'

۞۩═════۩۞

It takes one person to bring chaos within the community. One elliptic piece among the cogwheels and the machine breaks apart. One man, or woman, who thinks it is more beneficent for them to profit from others without their own contribution to the common goal. It might be lack of education and intelligence. It might be force of momentary weakness or necessity. It can be refusal to see the greater picture. Or emotions and personal feelings. Abuse and injustice in the past are also major contributors to the chaos.

Crime happens for many reasons. To Hergot Sholmes the cause has never been important. It is the results what matters. Some crime is harmless. Being a woman publicly, for example. But then there are murders, thefts, abuses. Small injustices leading to great ones.

In every place happens to be a criminal. Search high, search low, you will always find one. There are good men, there are evil men, there are men trying to survive, men believing they are doing the best for everyone while being deadly mistaken.

Sholmes used to deal with this. But in the end, you can either keep your faith in people, or go mad. With the decision for the retirement, the detective has chosen the first. Chooses over and over, each morning, day after day. In tending to the bees, there is a choice. It is a choice to step up a log, lean on the fence and chat with the new neighbours who happen to be Assassins and politicians, both also retired.

Basketville is a choice. Nobody says you have to stay. Or have a large garden to tend to. Smile each morning at your neighbours. It is your decision to have an afternoon tea and leave the five pennies on the counter when you take bread from the bakery while the owner is nowhere to be seen. Those are choices made each day, every day. They are difficult, but once you have your mind made up, they are not that hard. The key is to keep faith in people.

There are more difficult choices. Dr. Whatnot has been married once.

Sholmes lists thorough the last cheap detective story from Agate, sitting on the bed and pondering if this is the right time to choose to make a choice. Half a chapter later, the answer is yes. And the other answer is also yes.

Whatnot wakes up to a soft kiss placed upon brow.

۞۩═════۩۞

The winter has passed. March finds Basketville half-drowned in mud and melting snow. Vetinari is at the back of the house, checking up on the bees. They seem to be doing well, but it doesn't hurt to check and give them some sugary water.

Downey leans out of one of the window on the first floor and inquires: 'Darling, why are all my books in the library?'

'Because they are books, Downey, and books belong to the library. What are you even looking for, you don't sport books, as far as I remember, maybe besides as a fuel for the fire.'

'That,' Downey growls, 'was _one_ time. I am going to the Guild today, I need the _Botanical Compendium.'_

Vetinari looks up from the bees. He isn't wearing any kind of a bee-keeper suit, he has never needed one. 'Lowest shelf of that case left from the entrance door. Why are you going to the Guild?'

'Oh, I thought that I could pick up your cousin, check on the school, see the new laboratory. Plus, I am still doing a research-'

'Three different researches.'

'-alright, alright, three researches, doesn't change a thing that I am obligated by the law to report my progress. Which is why I need the book. I am going to leave about in an hour by the train, I'll return with Constantin in the evening.'

Vetinari frowns: 'Constantin?'

'We have talked about this, you said you don't mind him coming over for the spring break. We even spent two weeks making the guest bedroom in the attic, Havelock!' It sounds almost accusatory. Sholmes, a queer old dwarf who lives across the road, looks up from his newspapers and mutters something about typical married bantering under into the magnificent dwarven beard.

Vetinari says that yes, he remembers that, but so far Downey has been talking about a cousin, but where has Constantin come from all of sudden into this conversation?

Downey, who has meanwhile found the Compendium, which is actually a heavy brick of scribbled notes and sketches all bound together by a miracle and a power of will and glue, defenestrates himself out of the house and lands with a roll. When he gets up, there is last year grass in his hair. Vetinari ruffles it out and is rewarded by the Compendium being banged on his head.

'Havelock, darling,' Downey says in the voice he usually reserves for small children and peculiarly stubbornly stupid pupils, 'Constantin _is_ your cousin.' He sighs and then kisses Vetinari on cheek.

'What was that for?'

'Downey says, It was just because. Now excuse me, I have to get the rest of my things, I am leaving in an hour. There should be lunch prepared for you on the table, so you don't set the house ablaze with your cooking.

Vetinari pouts: 'That was _one_ time.' But he still bids the other man farewell and safe journey, don't get yourself into anything stupid.

Downey returns in the evening. Vetinari has grown bored around the house, so he has gone to pick him up at the small Basketville train station. It's already dark outside, but not a night-time yet when the train arrives with brakes screeching and screaming, steam and smoke filling the air. The white haired retired Assassin is carrying a bag of books and another bag of groceries. He helps a young man to get off the train while two dogs, Elliot and Emerald, run around like crazy, happy being off that hellish invention of fast travel.

Vetinari remembers Constantin from the time he used to teach at the Academy, despite it was only a year and half long period. He has no idea why people say the two of them look alike, even when Constantin takes his fake glasses off. It is a miracle of physics that the boy doesn't snap in half under the weight of his backpack. Vetinari says One would almost believe that you are moving in and not going for just a visit.

His cousin mumbles something about upcoming exams and plenty of studying material, and then tries to hide behind Downey. They all walk towards the house, it's uphill and across the whole village.

Along the way, Vetinari shares Dr. Whatnot's insights of the day on bee-keeping, and Downey talks about Mericet getting more and more unreasonable with age and what is new in the Guild. Constantin trails a bit behind with Emerald, who is trying to nibble the boy's ankles.

'When I came in thorough the gate, there was a fight in the yard, would you believe that?'

'Was it the Commander?' Vetinari asks with an audible yet invisible smug smile.

Downey says that no, it was actually the Ridicully brothers. 'I have no idea what the argument was about, but fighting on the Guild grounds is strictly prohibited outside of the gym, so I leapt in and threw them apart. They aren't getting any younger. I told them that I didn't give a damn who started it, but that I was ending it.'

Vetinari points out the bandage adorning Downey's forehead: 'And you are getting any younger?'

'No, I am not,' the man gives a sheepish smile. 'I've caught the Archchancellor's staff right behind the ear. It's quite a headache, but nothing serious. But Dr. Merigold thought it necessary to put a bandage on it, most possibly to make a fool of me.'

Constantin has found a fallen stick and is now making Emerald to fetch it. The dog is having the time of his life, especially because he takes it as a reason to get mud all over himself.

A young charming lady of chestnut hair and green linen gown stops them: 'Good evening, gentlemen. Ah, is this your son? I believe I haven't seen you around, dear boy. Helen Foxglove, such a pleasure to meet you,' she offers Constantin her hand.

Constantin wipes his on hand in trousers and then gives Mrs. Foxglove a firm handshake. 'Constantin Meserole. Not son, just a cousin. Only visiting here for a week, then I have to get back to school, actually.'

'Ah, that is excellent!' Foxglove exclaims.

'Why would that be excellent?' Constantin is confused. He doesn't want to talk to people, he would rather play with Emerald. And emerald would rather play with Constantin, but the dog is too polite to point it out, so he just sits next to the boy and impatiently wiggles his tail.

Foxglove radiates friendliness. Not in the aggressive manner, it is more of a soft approach with a tea. Assassins tend to distrust any kind of drink offered to them, as long as they haven't made it by themselves. 'There is going to be a Parents and Friends of School Association meeting next Thursday. So you know, you could come, since you are at... at the Academy,' she flashes a bright smile at them all, a smile that clearly says that she doesn't approves of the Guild of Assassins but certainly she holds the Assassins' Academy in high regards.

Downey turns on his social autopilot and says, Oh, we all will come, both Havelock and I used to be teachers, it is going to be wonderful to sit down and exchange our experiences, don't you think, Mrs. Foxglove? But don't you think it is going to feel stiff in the school building? School environment often makes people less confident and cooperative. I think it would be an excellent idea to hold the meeting at our house instead, the weather is going to be nice, it was in The Times this morning, we can move out the tables into the garden.

Mrs. Foxglove is, of course, absolutely delighted. 'Oh, Mr. Downey, that is so nice of you! You both have lived here for not as long as a year, but already you are so supportive of our little community. Oh, I will bring cake and- Ah, I see you are hurrying home. Well, see you on Thursday, Mr. Downey, Mr. Vetinari. See you, Constantin!'

Vetinari lets go off Downey's sleeve only once they reach the gate to their garden. 'Are you crazy?' he hisses at him.

'Was it really necessary to drag me all the way?' Downey rubs his shoulder and then his temples with a low groan. His head hurts.

Vetinari mutters something about house full of people he doesn't even know and adds that Downey could first think and only then talk. Elliot and Emerald are very happy to see the rest of their siblings, which in turn are equally as happy to see Constantin, and therefore the boys is promptly buried beneath a pile of fur and waggling tails.

۞۩═════۩۞

Half of the lands and forests, well more like shrubberies, surrounding Basketville belong to the Wickerworker's Manor. It used to be the whole of Basketville, but as richer people were moving out of the city to retire here, they bought the place apart a parcel by parcel. The Manor has been a property of the Ramkin family for three centuries at least, and it usually served as a resort for unwanted cousins.

For the past twenty five years, however, it served as a retirement place for Captain Tramain, a hero of over a dozen of battles who saved old Lord Ramkin's arse just as many times. Officially the man was housekeeper of the manor, but the truth was that ever since he was assigned there, it was very rare for anyone to pay the manor a visit.

Captain Tramain is the oldest man living in Basketville, that is if you ignore the rumour of that big granite stone on the main crossroad being actually a sleeping troll. He has a tremble in his right hand, too sensitive feeling in each joint, is blind on one eye, deaf on one ear and half-deaf on the other. He is a collection of scars, stubbles, callouses, patched clothes and muscles of steel. He has the intelligence of a man who has been alive for too long in places where anyone too slow and too inexperienced would be also too dead very soon.

Once a week he walks downhill into the Basketville best and only café to read the week worth in The Times. Any change is quite hard to get thorough his skill. He still thinks about Agate as a newcomer. His somewhat old fashioned brain doesn't allow him to call the Commander of the City Watch anything besides Young Lord Ramkin.

No one has ever told him that old Lord Ramkin has been dearly departed for over twenty years.

۞۩═════۩۞

The dinner is improvised. Downey's cooking is mainly improvising. Constantin helps, but it is obviously an excuse for not talking to Vetinari. His cousin has showed him the room in attic to put his things there, he even tried for a small talk, but it was like talking to an iceberg. Vetinari is very good when it comes to words, but Constantin's silence has proved unbeatable in a verbal combat. Having the social feeling of a dissected frog floating gently in formaldehyde, as Downey has so eloquently put it, he has no idea what it is he has done wrong.

After dinner, Downey excuses himself that his head hurts and wishing everyone a good night, he goes to sleep early. Vetinari is left alone with Constantin in the kitchen, as the later is doing the dishes and the first is absent-mindedly looking out of the window.

'What are your plan after you finish school, Constantin?”

A bit of angry silence, but then the boy, who is actually twenty, sighs and says: 'I suppose I stick around the guild for a bit more after my studies.'

Vetinari nods and ask, Are you aiming for a doctorate?

'No, nothing so ambitious. I have only taken interest in engineering. Not a thing Madam wants to see at home. I beg your pardon, did I say something funny?'

Vetinari makes a mental note and marks Constantin down not only as a very angry young man, but also very observant and smart young man, which is always a dangerous combination. Out loud he says: 'Oh, it is that I have never in my life called her anything else.

Constantin smiles, only briefly. Then he bows his head back down over the sink and pretends the plates are keeping him busier than they actually are.

There is a sigh from the table. 'I'll be in the library if you need anything.' The response consists of sounds of violent scrubbing and splashing water, and the response to that are limping footsteps on the stairs, which are a bit louder than they need to be.

Downey is groaning something in the only bedroom left in the house. It is something between My headache could kill people, and Could you two be less civilized around each other and just have a fight in the back yard, because I am fairly sure that would solve a lot of things. However, except for Elliot and Emma, nobody is paying him any attention.

Vetinari eventually crawls to bed once his candle runs out and he has heard Constantin making his way to his room in the attic. There is only one dog, who certainly isn't Emily, on the covers, snoring heavily. Vetinari gently moves it out of way, because he doesn't want to freeze to death, March is March and nights are still cold.

A low hum tells him that Downey isn't asleep yet, so he curls up and rolls into his arms. It gives him a feeling of safety, especially when Downey huffs, slowly rubs his back and presses their foreheads together. Vetinari thinks, He's got a fever. And then he thinks that Downey has taken off the bandage off his head and it has most likely ended up on the floor.

'What is it he has against me?' he whispers into the dark.

Downey is quiet for a while before he says in an equally quiet voice: 'People tend to see you in him. I remember he threw T'Malia out of the window when he was in the fourth grade, because she kept pushing him into various political debates and classes.' A sigh and then he continues. 'He asked people not to call him Meserole, so Mr. Constantin it is. It dragged less attention to him. People don't like to be compared to you all the time.'

Vetinari says that Constantin and he are nothing alike.

'You are a lot alike, Havelock. Only not on the obvious first sight.' His train of thought is cut off with a painful growl. 'Constantin is never going to be a better than average Assassin. But he is going to be a great person, and he is already good at assassinating.'

The other man wants to ask what is that supposed to mean, but instead he inquires about the headache. Downey mutters that it is getting worse with each minute passing and that by tomorrow he is going to have his head split in half.

'Have you taken anything for it?'

'I am fairly certain that any more laudanum would prove itself lethal to me. Ugh.'

Vetinari sighs that nothing much can be done here and gives the poor aching head a kiss. It somehow pinches on his lips. Downey falls asleep before anything else can be said. The silence is almost absolute, save for the sounds of six dogs sleeping and dreaming. The house creaks and settles in its foundations.

It starts raining and Vetinari still can't fall asleep. He is doing his best to drift off, but he finds it hard to do so. For some strange reason, he feels anxious. Not about anything specific, just anxious in general. His brain considers it a good time to once again pull out the list of things he did wrong and said wrong or at least could have gone better. He has seen that list so many times that during the duller parts he is now able to plan future changes to the garden.

Another obstacle on his way to the land of dreams is this throbbing pain in his head, sort of a pounding. It starts behind his left ear, only a small thing, barely noticeable, but it grows stronger and also spreads fast. It feels like a heavy burning liquid – it doesn't matter how he turns his head, the pain seems to fell the lowest points.

When it can no longer be avoided for the pain to ignore in his jaws and temples, he crawls out of the bed and makes his way to the kitchen. It surprises him to see Constantin there at the table. He is going thorough some large papers with a ruler and a pencil with the aid of three candles.

The boy has taken off his glasses, which he doesn't need anyway, and has his hair tied in a tight ponytail. Seeing him from profile, Vetinari admits that they do look a bit alike, the two of them. Not much. He can almost forgive Mrs. Foxglove accusing him of being Constantin's parent.

They exchange looks, silently judge each other's night gown. No words are said. Constantin goes back to whatever it is he is actually doing with the papers and rulers, Vetinari puts the kettle on.

A thing has to be said about Downey, he thinks, his knowledge of herbs is also very medical. And his tendency to precisely label everything you put into his hands is very useful in kitchen. Vetinari finds a box of dried St. John's wort and steals some early leaves from the lemon balm sitting in its flowerpot by the window, and fixes himself a tea.

After a second thought, he pours down another mug and sets it besides Constantin's elbow without a word. However, this mug isn't sweetened by three drops of honey. It doesn't matter anyway, as the young man doesn't touch the mug at all.

Vetinari drinks his steaming tea in silence, with only occasional scratching of a pencil on paper. Then he puts the mug in the sink and returns to bed upstairs.

He manages to fall asleep very fast this time.

۞۩═════۩۞

It is often said that the Shades lacks any kind of social hierarchy outside of gangs. It is said by people who don't really know much about the criminal underground. Nowadays it is far messier, because the rest of the city is trying to interfere with the _status quo_ , but years ago the Shades was its own city within the city, with its own laws, something you could call police if you were very stupid, and even their own aristocracy. A lot of it still persist, despite their Lordships and our Ladies would rather bite out their tongues than to consider someone such as Raven of Shades a _nobillity_.

The Twinkle-Clement-Monger family is one of those rugged aristocrats. Their traditional family business is thievery. In an attempt to balance the tradition with the new city laws bestowed upon them by Vetinari, the Thieves' Guild has turned into some sort of a clan in the recent years.

Young Lucius could have been a great thief if he wanted to, but the trick is that he has never felt any inclining to such an aspiration. “Everyone does the Business, Pa,” he has explained many times, and will explain even many more times.”How am I to express myself if I do what everyone else does?”

Pa Twinkle-Clement-Monger, head of the family and in fact Lucius's great-uncle, Pa being merely a title, has quite a liberal approach and the young boy has been promised to have his chance in any other field as long as he finds anyone willing to teach him.

Which is why Lucius Twinkle-Clement-Monger has been called nothing but Lus Twinklemon for the past ten years. There isn't any chance the bloody Assassins would let this opportunity to mock their classmate just swim by without a notice.

Lus doesn't really care about that. Right now he has his world of deadly creatures so small that you can't see them on his work table, and the biggest trouble of his life packed away in Basketville.

۞۩═════۩۞

He wakes up with the feeling that something isn't only plainly not quite right, but that a lot of things are, in fact, very wrong. For a starter, he doesn't feel his right hand. On the other hand, he feels suspiciously lightweight and like a cart ran over him. He didn't take _that_ much laudanum yesterday, only few drops. It shouldn't give him such a hangover.

Certainly there is an improvement since yesterday, because his head doesn't hurt. He rubs his eyes and face as a preparation for the cruel morning when he has to sit up and get out of the bed and-

Hold on.

Wait a moment.

He runs his hand, left one because the right one sort of lacks feeling, along his chin. He is fairly sure he had a beard yesterday. And a long number of years before that too.

Slowly, very slowly he opens his eyes, given they are _his_ eyes, and carefully fixing his gaze on the ceiling, he pokes the body laying on the bed next to him.

'Downey?' he tries it. The voice sounds alien to him.

'Mhhhrfff,' is the muffled response into a pillow. That doesn't sound like Downey either. ''Lock, should I be worried that you all of sudden speak in D major flat instead of your usual G minor?'

He responds, Perhaps a little yes.

The mattress creaks and shifts, as Downey sits up. Vetinari also sits up. They look at each other. They look at themselves.

Vetinari's first thought is: I look better in the mirror, but not much.

His second thought is: I won't start screaming if Downey doesn't start first.

It takes them both a while to take it in. You don't get to wake up in someone else's body every day. And to be fair with them, they both are very curious. They have never seen themselves from this perspective. Curiosity is a good thing, they both conclude, as it dulls the shock and shoos away panic, which has seemed inevitable just mere moments ago.

'I suggest we get dressed,' says Vetinari, 'don't cause panic and pretend everything is fine. At least for as long as Constantin is here. If things don't go back to normal by then or we don't figure out what to do by ourselves, the we... Hmm...'

'Then I am going to storm into the Unseen University and yell at people.' Downey inspects his new temporal bones, especially behind ears. He hisses, there is a spot that hurts to the touch. Vetinari repeats the motion to find out he has the exactly same problem. 'I am quite certain it's because I got hit into my head.'

Downey decides to be the first one to claim the bathroom this morning. He manages it there on the second try, because during the first his leg gave up and he fell on the ground with a half-swallowed curse. 'Dammit, Havelock, is it always like that?'

Vetinari says, No but often, and then he leaves the bed, steps over the dogs who lick at his feet, and goes to get dressed once Downey leaves the room. At first he is tempted to wear his own clothes, but then he realizes they wouldn't fit him. Downey might be a bit shorter, but much broader in build.

And so he opens Downey's closet. It contains mostly anthracite black, with occasional flash of white or deep purple, because Downey like anybody else takes advantage of retirement. What seems more interesting to Vetinari is the fact, that majority of the content aren't clothes. It's weapons. It is enough to arm a decent army, given that you wouldn't mind the army fighting almost exclusively face to face, and they'd have to be very efficient with knives.

Vetinari goes for the black; pants, shirt, trousers, socks, sash, shoes. Nothing extra fancy, but nothing plain, because Downey's wardrobe doesn't know the word plain. Upon closer inspection, the shirt reveals to have the Assassin's Guild coat of arms embroidered on the breast pocket.

He picks up six knives and puts them in his sleeves and pockets, he is an Assassin after all, this is just having manners and education. Curiously, he can't fit any blade into the boots. It's for the simple reason that those are armed by themselves.

When he goes into the bathroom, Downey has already left it. He shaves. Downey's jawline is nice, so why to hide it. He combs his hair. It looks strange when he looks at it in the mirror and for a while he wonders why. I have never known that Downey has this much of a forehead, let alone that scar, he thinks. Which is when it hits him that this is exactly how he used to do his hair back when he himself had them short.

It takes him good twenty minutes to get out of the bathroom, looking somewhat like Downey usually looks. As he makes his way to the kitchen, he comes to the conclusion that wearing a different body is like learning to walk in a different kind of shoes.

In the kitchen, Downey is making pancakes for breakfast while Constantin is silently sitting at the table, pretending he is not there at all. He looks like he hasn't slept much in the night. Vetinari blinks a few times, trying to figure out what is it so odd on seeing himself from behind.

'Good morning, Doctor,' says Constantin.

'Morning,' he automatically replies. 'Havelock, for Offler's sake, what is that on your _head?_ ' It is important to keep the role, no matter what.

'That,' Downey replies as he flips his current pancake, 'is a braid. A very practical thing. Keeps your hair out of your face. What is it that it is on _your_ head?'

Constantin half-chuckles before he remembers who he is siding with in this household. He pretends to be very occupied with the pancake on the table in front of him. Vetinari is quietly amused by the sight, because Constantin is very reserved into accepting anything his supposed cousin has made.

Oh yeah, he is in Downey's shoes now, isn't he? He has to be friendly to that child. Except, Constantin isn't child for, how long, five years or so? He has better track of Sybil's dragons family lines than his own. On the other hand, Sybil writes lengthy letters to him on this matter, while his family, consisting of an aunt and her son holding too many grudges for no apparent reason, sends him one postcard for Hogswatch when he is lucky. And, of course, work related post. But with his retirement, that one has decreased in its numbers.

Vetinari sits down to the table and his effort to be social is rewarded with a fresh pancake. He gets a gooseberry marmalade to it. Well, truth be told, he is very hungry and Downey had chugged down at least half a bottle of laudanum, given how terrible he feels. He helps himself to the coffee, because coffee helps with everything, and starts eating.

It takes about ten minutes of focused eating until Constantin comes to the conclusion that he should be at least a bit friendly to anyone who is capable of making pancakes like this. He turns on the chair towards the cooker and asks: 'Could I also get a braid?'

'Sure.'

۞۩═════۩۞

Helen Foxglove is the only element in the overlap of the set of adults under fifty years of age, and women, where all elements of the sets are people living in Basketville. She is a sole teacher and also the headmaster of Baskteville elementary school which is attended by seven children altogether, two of them being hers.

The life has been far less kinder to Mrs. foxglove than Mrs. Foxglove has been to life. But she is better now, darling, she has moved out of the city and has her dogs back now and children too, lost her second husband along the way. Oh, don't be sorry, darling, actually that was when things began to go better.

Late Mr. Foxglove was an insufferable person, a very lazy kind of cruelty. Never harmed anyone. Not physically at least. Not by his own hand, anyway. Of course, Mrs. Foxglove wouldn't phrase it like that, but her friends and acquaintances of her once-been-husband would.

Mr. Foxglove has pissed of many people in his life. Not simply plainly angered, the mere thought of the man set those people's blood to boiling temperature. Some of them also knew then Ms. Foxglove. One of those people had quite a large sum of money and didn't mind having a bit smaller sum of money as much as he minded Mr. Foxglove.

When Mrs. Foxglove came to greet her two new Basketville neighbours two years ago, the very first words the shorter one with the pristine white hair said to her were: “Foxglove? I could swear I have heard that name somewhere before.”

۞۩═════۩۞

They tend to the roses while Constantin does what is supposedly schoolwork in his new attic room. The roses are tea roses and when they bloom later this year, they are going to drown the garden and nearby settlements in creamy orange colour and sweet scent. They were Vetinari's idea.

The roses need a lot of help, not only because they are the newest addition to the garden, but also because the mint and lavender have put aside their grudges and differences and united against this new thorny intruder. The mint was Downey's idea which got out of hand very quickly, like most of Downey's ideas.

The lavender, that they got with the house, the original and only sovereign in the garden at the time. It blooms whenever it pleases, which is nearly all year round, and goes wherever it pleases, which is everywhere, as long as the mint doesn't feel like going there first.

'You know, I have been thinking.'

'That had to hurt.' Vetinari regrets the sentence the moment it lifts off his lips.

'Well, _this_ did,' Downey mumbles with a pained expression and moves to another bush. On Downey's face this hurt sulking looks usually a bit cute. But Downey hasn't got his face today, and the thin lips and groomed beard with very pointed eyebrows all make him look like he is about to spit acid. 'Never mind, it wasn't anything important.'

Vetinari knows that what Downey means is, I think it is important but you don't want to listen to me. Which isn't true, Vetinari wants to listen. But he also wants to be a bit of a teasing moron. Most of the time on most of the topics, Downey doesn't mind, hell, he is even a worse tease, being in the field since school. But there are a few things he takes personally.

A soft sigh, a quick look around to make sure nobody is around and watching. A kiss on the back of the neck. Thinking about the kiss is sort of odd, who is he actually kissing? He pushes the thought away. Bad though, sit!

'I want to know,' he whispers. Downey grunts something in reply. 'Tell me, mmm? What is it you've been thinking about?'

The other man smiles and puts down the small green scoop trowel. 'We aren't telling Constantin about... about this thing that happened to us, are we?'

A nod of affirmation. Vetinari says that he isn't keen on being asked for explanations when he has none.

'So you can actually approach Constantin much easier.' When Vetinari doesn't get it, Downey continues: 'Constantin and I are on friendly terms. A lot of other pupils and students are. If you just go along with being, well, being me, you know... I mean, you can get to know him like this. And meanwhile I am going to be his cousin who might have social feelings of a brain-dead amphibian, but at least I will not act like a bull in pottery.'

Vetinari thinks about it for a while and then chuckles. 'You know, you are really good at this.'

At what, asks Downey.

'At being the opportunistic, pragmatical and calculating ex-tyrant.'

'Well of course, darling. I've been in charge of the Conlegium for years.'

Vetinari jabs him, You know what I mean, to which Downey says that yes, he does know indeed, now Havelock be a darling, stop trying to snuggle under my shirt which is in fact yours, and return to your roses, because otherwise the aphids are going to suck them dry.

The lunch is cold and light because nobody really feels like cooking. Having eaten himself half-full, Constantin excuses himself and goes to loiter thorough the orchard. The last time he was here was exactly a year ago, he needs to check how much has changed. Or at least, that is what he says. Vetinari in his role of the ex-Master of Assassins instructs him to take the dogs for a walk while he is at it. There isn't any word of complaint.

Vetinari has settled for helping with the dishes. He asks Downey if this I what the man calls friendly approach.

'When it comes to Constantin? Yes.'

'What would be an unfriendly approach, then?'

Downey hands him a plate to dry, Anything between a stiletto in ribcage and pretending he is not existing. He adds: 'Constantin is very good at pretending lack of existence. People tend to fall for it quite often.'

'Do they?'

'A lot of teachers tend to not notice his presence in class. Much to Mericet's amusement, that boy is still claiming to be unlike you in every way possible.'

Vetinari doesn't find anything about it amusing. But then, Mericet has always had a bit odd sense of humour. Well, if you can call it humour, anyway.

That is something Downey agrees on with him. He adds: 'I think I can manage the dishes on my own. Be such a sweetheart and go make sure that Constantin doesn't shoot our cherry trees apart, would you? No, no. Don't ask questions, you'll know when you see him. Off you go.'

Vetinari laughs at that, but takes his leave nevertheless. It is better to leave the Assassin alone in kitchen when he wants to be. And by the gods, Downey wants to be alone right now. As soon as Vetinari is out of the door, he carefully sets the saucer he is holding on the desk, and breaks at waist.

The man pulls his thigh, which isn't actually his, is it now, to his chest and chokes back a sob. “Ow.” He sinks to the floor and rests his back against the kitchen counter. He is trying not to curse and cuss, because those are only words without any real meaning except the one people give them, so they don't help anything. He is trying not to cry, although this one is really hard, Vetinari could still be around the house and hear.

Downey has seen Vetinari when the cramps and pain kicked in handful of times. The first time it was the year Vetinari began teaching. Downey needed to discuss... What was it he needed anyway? He entered the office and there Vetinari was, curled up in a ball, pretty much the same way Downey now is.

Over the course of time, Downey has offered plenty of various anaesthetics, but Vetinari has an opinion on them, and this opinion should not be repeated in front of minors, ladies, and everyone else for that matter, just in case they'd repeat it elsewhere.

Downey quietly suffers. He dulls the pain by thinking about other things. He needs to buy groceries. Eggs. Tea and coffee. Butter, rolls, sugar. Some hard rock candy, so Constantin has something to sneakily thieve in the kitchen in the dead of the night. Caramel and cream swirl, he thinks, I haven't had caramel and cream swirl in ages. Or ginger toffee, that's supposed to be healthy, given it doesn't rot your teeth away.

He ponders how long this usually lasts. The leg pain, that is. It would be good to know how long has it already lasted, too. It feels like a strange cross-breed between seven seconds and seven years. Something wet and cold pokes his face and then something even wetter but also very sticky and rough slides all over his face. Downey hasn't got the strength to look up to find out which dog it is. The ball of fluffy fur huffs away a moment afterwards anyway.

Bones and innards as dog food, he thinks. Ink. Poppy seeds, flour, vinegar, oil. Milk. We haven't had any this morning for breakfast. He cannot remember what has happened to the last four ounces of milk. He cannot remember what other things to buy. Everything hurts too much. Pain is a liquid, he concludes, it fills the vessel and takes its shape.

There are footsteps. He doesn't know the sound of them. A pair of hands picks him up from the floor and carry him for some time before they rest him on the bed.

A voice he doesn't know says: “You manage the dishes like Boggis manages his yearly Guild budget.”

There is something important about the voice. What is it?

There are hands in his hair and on his leg and inexplicably this way it hurts far less.

Oh. Oh yes. That's the important thing.

It's his voice.

Except it isn't his now, is it?

۞۩═════۩۞

Even dwarves need their own physicians. Mines are places where injuries happen often, and when they do you need nothing short of a miracle. The miner-doctors are held in high regards. Their expertise is useful out of mine as well. Majority of dwarves doesn't leave their work unless they have to leave to war.

Thorough the course of history, half of the wars the dwarves have had was with each other, which included secret tunnels, sabotages, collapsed caves and whole underground settlements, and the other half was with trolls. Being mauled by a troll is like being pummelled by a very intelligent avalanche of rocks. Miner-doctors are much sought after.

Whatnot is a seasoned veteran. When a poorly dodged battleaxe left him with a limp on both legs, he was told by his king to retire. He's left the path of surgeon for the soldiers and returned to the depths of the Überwald mines. By a coincidence and an old acquaintance he crossed paths with the post peculiar Hergot Sholmes.

Sholmes's work required him to move to Ankh-Morpork. Whatnot followed, waving off any arguments and comments about throwing off and away his shining miner-doctor carrier. 'A good physician, my dear friend, can make living anywhere.'

After the whole thing with Mortalmerry, they settled in Basketville. Even such an idyllic middle of nowhere such as Basketville needs someone experienced in patching people together and prescribing herbal tea for your cough. And retired detectives. The village lacks in witches.

۞۩═════۩۞

Dead of the night. Were it later in the year, the air would be thick with cicadas chirping. But now in early March it is silent.

Downey sleeps a dreamless sleep. Curled up on his side like a disgraced cat, at the edge of the bed. Earlier he has limped downhill to the village to shop and then all the way back to home. It was exhausting. How can Vetinari stand walking at all with a leg like this, he simply doesn't understand.

Downey's body is a strong and agile machine built of muscles, scars and reflexes, and he keeps it in a perfect condition. If you look aside from the alcohol. And the cigarettes. And the opiates. And research of drugs and poisons is illegal to be done on unwilling sentient beings, so... Look, aside from the liver and the brain, Downey's body has been always taken a good care of, as long as Downey himself had a say in it.

Vetinari sleeps and dreams at the same time. Sleep is a very important part of the day. It gives the brain the much needed time for maintenance. Sometimes Vetinari wonders whether that HEX thing at the Unseen University sleeps. It probably doesn't. That would explain a lot.

This night the dreams are a strange mixture. He knows they are dreams, but still he cannot wake up. But he wants to. He dreams of wild white roses, of ropes hanging from lanterns and bodies hanging on those ropes. He never looks up at them, he sees only the feet and the hem of their trousers. He dreams of poisoned candles and every time one goes out it sounds like a shot from the _gonne_. He dreams of men in plain yet menacing clothes without faces, and of faces without bodies. He dreams of pain from broken ribs. Vetinari has never broken a rib. He wonders, in the dream while a blooming rose grows thorough his shin, how can he possibly know how does a broken rib feel.

Constantin dreams while being wide awake. But then, he is twenty years and four months old, for a boy of his age it is a normal state of being. Once he has assured himself that his cousin and the old white tiger are asleep he sneaks all the way down to the kitchen and burrows deep into the shelves in search for something sweet. He doesn't have to sneak with much effort. Firstly he is an Assassin, sneaking is another term for plain walking as long as you don't want to loiter. And then he has been always good when it came to simply escaping people's attention. Old tiger has always found him, though, it was like a hex.

Right now Constantin is sobbing into a bowl of hard rock candy of a distinct caramel flavour. He dreams of his love and of his mother and a happy nice life the three of them could have together if life was a bit gentler. He dreams of all the terrible things that are very likely going to happen. In a way he wants either Downey or Vetinari to wake up and go downstairs, find him here and pull all of these worries and terrible thoughts out of his head. He wants to talk with someone about all of it. He'd rather be swallowed by the ground on the spot as he was than to ever hint to anyone about any of this. When you are twenty and two couples of months, life is hard and nobody understands it.

Sometimes you need to steal candy in the dead of the night and cry into it, because your life is headed for a huge bush of nettles. You eat thorough half of the paper bag of those probably caramel bonbons and worry how are you going to explain it the next morning to your cousin and your ex-headmaster of the school and also the ex-leader of your Guild who has spent countless nights going thorough the poison textbook with you page by page instead of doing his job.

Constantin at least doesn't need to explain anything in the morning, because when the bag is opened in the morning, the missing content is passed of with a shrug. Strange, he would have never thought Downey to have a sweet tooth.

Sockcrates, Constantin's favourite Ephebean philosopher for the sole reason he is dead and doesn't spill out any more philosophy, wrote: _“A man labels his fellow men into categories, because order brings peace to his mind. A wise man labels his fellow men into meaningless categories, because order is bullshit.”_ Thus Constantin labels people based on candy.

Lus has a thing for nougat. His life hasn't been much sweet, his candy as well might be, even through he has to fight for it.

Madam, never mother, likes those pralines with brandy and sour cherry inside. She makes it well known that if you touch the praline she wanted to take, you might just as well drop dead on spot.

Downey relies on his reputation of all kind of food but especially mint humbugs being a dangerous game when he is around, and so he never has to even threaten. Those humbugs aren't all poisonous, only ten or so in the bag, and the also aren't all that great if you ask Constantin, he has had one and it tasted like mint and that was it. Downey hasn't really a sweet tooth.

Constantin himself picks sweets at random, because like hell he is letting anyone know he has a thing for lavender cream. Can you imagine the gossips?

Vetinari, he thinks, is the type to claim an unpopular candy, such as salty caramel, as his favourite in order not to have to fight over it with anybody. Constantin doesn't know it, but he is wrong here. Vetinari is too old and too done. He takes whatever kind of candy he pleases, he has damn earned it.

Oblivious to any kind of philosophy, which is usually reserved for people dead, annoying and any combination of the aforementioned, Downey observes the morning kitchen thorough Vetinari's eyes. He noticed it yesterday and noticed it again today that they see all colours much brighter. Until yesterday he thought his own shirt to be one colour – black. Today he has find out it is actually seven different blacks mingled and mashed together without any pattern or care. He has a sudden urge to find and strangulate the dyer. It can sometimes surprise you what you find out when you are not exactly yourself. For example, why it always takes so long for Vetinari to pick clothes. And why he has so many opinions on them.

It isn't the shirt what irks the most, thought. It's the fact that Vetinari has managed to devour half of the sugar bowl and sweets. First thing first, the probably caramel stuff was meant for Constantin, not you Havelock. And the other thing was that Downey has never gotten a cavity in his life, and he might love Vetinari more than his plants, but if this man does anything terrible to his teeth, he is going to defenestrate him. It is a question in which body, but if his gets a damn cavity, it can just as well be thrown out of a window or two.

Vetinari isn't thinking about anything. He feels numb and tired, the ribcage still feels broken and it doesn't feel broken at all. Every breath he takes doesn't hurt and it always surprises him. He is aware that he is breathing. That is something people usually don't do. Usually people aren't aware of themselves. Of course, people often aren't aware of anything at all. Being aware is, in a way, a curse. It forces you to see what could be better.

When he was younger, Vetinari believed he could change things. He wasn't entirely wrong, of course, but he would love to have the power to change things more. Not only the city, the world could have been a better place, all that was needed were people who'd pull their head out of their arse to simply see what needs to be done. But the vast majority refused to. Maybe they weren't even capable of it.

A few weeks after Musturum Ridicully got appointed as the Archchancellor, he was invited to the University to share a drink and a conversation with the man. He went, it would had been very impolite not to. Ridicully twice as old as he and a couple of years above that. Physically, that is. Mentally, the Archchancellor said while handing him another glass of brandy, you are three centuries my senior, Havelock.

'You lack my experience,' was the very next sentence. Vetinari asked him to elaborate on that. 'You have very nice plans for the future and what changes ought to be made. It has this one catch, you see. Everything you tell me here is possible only with a model men – highly intelligent, perfectly healthy and round in magically neutral frictionless vacuum.'

Now, almost two decades later, he thinks he understands why Ridicully had left the University after graduation and retreated to hunt nature. He thinks he understands a lot of people far more than he used to when he was thirty. On occasions when he allows himself the luxury of especially deep introspection, he has the feeling that Sybil's kindness is perfectly reasonable.

Elliot's mind is occupied with the fact that Emma is getting a head rub from their pack human while he isn't getting any. It is so unfair. He whines to get some attention, but all he receives is a slice of ham which the young new human slips him secretly under the table. Oh well. Sometimes you just get ham, and there is nothing you can do about it.

۞۩═════۩۞

Christian Agate is a professional writer and novelist. Not only that, he is a _successful_ professional writer and novelist. He retired to Basketville sixteen years ago, because he thought the romantic countryside would help him to focus more on his writing. For an interview with the Times, he told to William de Worde that he was wrong about that, but that he wouldn't change. That is the only statement, besides his name and age, that was published in the interview without any artistic corrections and additions to the truth.

William, like a lot of other people who happen to know something about literature, has a lot of opinions on Agate's novels. But after that interview, much to his very own surprise, he has found out that he hasn't got the same opinions about the writer himself.

The interview itself took place in Ember after the battle in Koom Valley that actually didn't happen. According to William de Worde's dis-organiser record, the interview went like this:

'So, Mr. Agate, tell our readers, how do you come up with your characters for the fantastic detective series?'

A pause with background sound of a drink or perhaps a soup being slurped. And then: 'Look, Worde. Let's put it like this: I can tell you the truth. Or, and now pay attention, I can tell you what your readers want to read.'

'Those two are exclusive?'

'You work in press, young man. If you wanted, you could write this interview all by yourself and nobody would bat an eyelid.'

Another long pause, rustling of paper, followed by: 'Right. So, what if you tell me about yourself and your writing, while I write down an interview here?'

۞۩═════۩۞

'Have you talked to Constantin?' Downey asks from bed.

'No.'

Downey stops staring at the ceiling and sits up. More or less. He stuffs all the pillows behind his back. It is halfway between laying and sitting. 'You should.'

Vetinari, having finally found the bottom part of the pyjamas in the wardrobe, sighs. He's never understood what Downey has against classic night gown and why he insists onto wearing special trousers and shirt to bed. Or why he has the stored separately, thus making it impossible to find a complete set when the other one is only good for laundry. He doesn't say any of that, of course, he only asks why should he even talk to Constantin.

'First, he is your family. Family should care about each other. And you are the older one and supposed to be reasonable. Second, he isn't going to approach me while he thinks I am you, so there is that. And third,' Downey counts on fingers, 'something is bothering him.'

'Does it? How do you know'

Downey says, I have been his teacher for ten years or so and I happen to have a functional pair of eyes. When it comes to teaching, Downey takes it very seriously.

'Alright,' Vetinari unbuttons his shirt to take it off. 'And you want to make it my problem, don't you?' The response is something about everything being Vetinari's problem, one way or another.

Vetinari turns around and Downey can only stare. When you can see your own back clearly, you are either between two very large and very well placed mirrors, or you have a very big problem. Only rarely you get the view from the comfort of your bed while you still have all you important pieces attached. Downey's never seen his own back. Now that he does, he comes to conclusion that he could go thorough his life without this experience.

_Verbo Incooperativus Testis._

Vetinari has seen it, of course. He's never mentioned it, never questioned it. Never a word. Only a terrified look in his eyes. Downey was a considerate person and tried to keep his backs covered even around this person with whom he didn't feel the need to, without really understanding why would it cause Vetinari such discomfort.

Now he understands. The scars merged into one gigantic scarred tissue. In places the dark colour has faded away, in other it is smeared underneath the skin. Of course, it wasn't meant to be artwork. But Downey knows a thing or two about tattoos, Vetinari's eyes see every uneven shade.

 _Verbo Incooperativus Testis._ Even among the complicated abstract pattern of spirals, dots and lines, the words are easily distinguishable. It looks as if an old god of a primitive fish-people tribe has emerged from the sea of flesh, sending ripples and waves of scars across his backs, and shouting these three words without a sound.

Vetinari can probably sense him staring. 'What?'

'Nothing. Put the shirt on.'

The bed is slightly warm and soft. The both men in it are even softer, although not in the metaphorical way. It feels quite awkward to be curled around each other when the other body is, in fact, yours. Vetinari finds out that he has too many bones. Downey chuckles, Now you see why I never sleep on your shoulder.

They shift positions. Downey's body is shorter but it has more mass. It's broader, more muscular, not ascetic, the chest is an excellent pillow. Vetinari's hair is silky and has grown out over the course of the recent years. There would be soft kisses and maybe not so soft touches, but the situation, as mentioned before, is awkward an none of the two feel the need to figure out if they can bear it even more awkward.

'What do you think that is the matter with Constantin?'

'How am I supposed to know? Do I seem like a mind reader to you?'

Vetinari says, No. But hasn't Downey been the boy's teacher for about a decade?

There is a gentle sigh. 'Constantin doesn't get eaten up by small petty things. And for scale, he considers school a small petty thing. So from the top of my head, either he's gotten himself banned from crossbows, or something went down with Twinklemon.'

Vetinari says, Given that he nearly shot the orchard to splinters with that thing he has constructed, I don't think it is the crossbows. 'What's up with Twinkle-Clement-Monger?'

Oh. They are together. More or less. Sort of. Downey is vague in this.

'Are you saying that my cousin is bedding a heir to what in other states would be called a criminal empire?' Vetinari sits up, weight mainly on his elbows. The gravity forces Downey's head into his lap.

'I think the two of them haven't gotten _that_ far. But headed that way, I suppose.'

The bed creaks as Vetinari's head hits the pillows again as the man just drops. He bursts into laughter. When asked what is this about, he answers: 'He'd make a damn good politician.'

'Our _alma mater_ loves to spit out potential politicians. It isn't that hard to do politics if you don't mint imbuing other people with sharp points.'

The laughter fades and the air is suddenly serious: 'Speaking of schools, tomorrow is Thursday.'

Downey asks if it is the school gathering thing that Vetinari is referring to. Of course he is. Also also considers the whole event Downey's problem, because after all it was the retired headmaster who had this excellent idea to host it in their very own home.

'Ugh. I hate you.'

A smirk. 'Tell me something I don't know, dear.'

'I love you, too.'

'I said: something I don't know.'

'You don't know how much.' Downey presses a soft kiss on the neck. Maybe it would help if I didn't think about it as _my_ neck or _his_ neck but our neck instead, he thinks. It doesn't help really, it only makes the terminology more fun.

Vetinari feels playful. 'Oh? And how much then?' All of sudden, there are slim and cold hands underneath his shirt. Vetinari has never realized he has so cold hands, but apparently he does. The fingers softly trace the half-faded scars.

'Enough for a lack of eloquence to be considered a virtue.'

They both can bear the situation becoming far more awkward. To the surprise of the both of them, it isn't awkward at all.

'Ours,' Downey whispers. 'Not mine. Not yours. Ours.' He traces kisses everywhere and anywhere he can reach. 'We aren't nineteen, we've grown up. We can share.'

Vetinari is pulling at the dark hair, eyes closed because the view makes it weird. Not awkward, but certainly very weird. He thinks they ought a very large mirror somewhere in the house. They haven't a dressing room, so maybe bedroom or bathroom. He would prefer bathroom. The bath is big enough for the both of them, although not much water can then fit in. Not like it matters, because if they decide to share the bath, the water is one of the last things they are interested in.

He thinks about how it always surprises him that Downey is so caring and gentle. If it was the first time, if it was the tenth time, it wouldn't be strange. But now he has lost count and is always surprised and is always surprised by his surprise.

He wishes he remembered how many times the man has told him that he loves him. He wishes he knew how many times he had told him anything else instead of the simple 'I love you.' He wishes he knew why Downey means it each time. What Vetinari knows are the reasons the man doesn't mean it for. Power. Profit. Physical strength. Now, he is realizing between pants and groans and sweet whispers, that it isn't for physical appearance either.

Eyes open. The two of them lock looks like most men lock the vault containing family jewels.

They have grown up.

They can share.

 

 


	2. The Heart

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Parents and Friends of School meeting, night talks full of feelings, breakfasts, the meaning of silence. Somebody unexpected arrives to Basketville and solves troubles in the traditional way without being aware there have been any troubles at all. New character introductions!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This took far too long, I hate everything.

When Vetinari wakes up it isn't even early in the morning. But it isn't late in the night either. Even during his office days he usually slept at this time. The strange time between half past three and four in the morning, when neither thoughts or space are real, and everything is heavy and only half tangible, all in a very dim hazy greyscale, as if painted by a hungover imp which had run out of colours the evening before when his iconographer had left him alone in the exotic dancers' club.

Not that Vetinari bothers with such a poetic thought at the moment. People who wake up trembling and in cold sweat usually don't. He briefly considers sitting up with head in hands, trying to just breathe it out. His side aches, he's been lying on it for too long, so he decides sitting up is a good idea. He stares at the floorboards which are new, or at least only two years old, and his feet which aren't really his but sort of are.

What was that about sharing the last evening? Is it possible for a body to influence the thoughts of its wearer? It would explain Downey being so unusually philosophical. It would also explain why Vetinari cannot think of the right words.

Vetinari likes words, words are easy. They are much like crossword, you only have to line them up. They do not make sense alone, but a sentence composed out of them is greater than sum of its components. Perhaps they are less like a crossword and more like a set of chess. In Downey's head the chessboard is all over the place, some of the pieces are missing and the rest of them are in every colour possible, some even shift between colours and, what is worse, shapes.

His breath calms. Difficult as it is, thinking helps. The phantom pain in his hand fades, odd as it is, given he lacked any kind of feeling in it ever since he's gotten it. He has asked Downey about it yesterday. It's been this numb for couple of decades but don't you worry about it, it works just fine, Downey has said.

Something tugs at the back of his shirt. 'His' meaning that he is currently wearing it, just like it is his hand what aches and his forehead what feels like on frozen fire.

Correction, _someone_ tugs at his shirt, and the someone is Downey. 'C'mere, dear.' The man sounds as if at least half asleep. He pulls Vetinari back under the covers and wraps them around him. A living shield against the worlds. 'I'm 'ere. 'Tis fine. Nothin's gonna get ye.'

The words are slurring together, because the man is not fully awake and his muscles cooperate in the same manner caught thieves cooperate with the Watch, that is only enough not to be handed over to the Guild. Vetinari think it's very human. And also very cute. It translates to: 'Havelock, I would be rather sleeping, but you need somebody talking to you, so I am trying, although I am aware it isn't much, or at least I would be aware if I was a bit more awake.'

'But what if something tries?'

'Then I'll glare at till it buggers off. Wit' this face it'll work.' Vetinari has to chuckle at that. Coming from anyone else, he could have taken it personally. Of course, it was true, but there is this thing called tact, people, have you heard of it?

He still wants reassurance. He wants to hear nothings. 'Love, tell me something nice.'

Downey mumbles something about sunflowers. Vetinari wonders why sunflowers. I think Constantin would like sunflowers, Havelock. Bees love 'em. Bright like sun. That's why they're sunflowers. Makin' the sun flow, ye see?

Vetinari doesn't manage to turn it into an etymological debate, because he drifts back to sleep. He doesn't dream of anything, but is distantly aware of Downey's talk falling apart as he is also sinking away from wakefulness, and his chest rising and falling. It is a solid, living thing. Warm. Like wood. Their cottage is also wood, mostly. Wood is home.

When they wake again, together, almost at the same time, there is already breakfast on the table. Rolls and butter and marmalade. The last summer work was worth the marmalade. And there is coffee, which is excellent. There is also Constantin, who looks like he hasn't slept most of the night if at all. Vetinari makes a mental note to teach him how to apply powder so it seems more natural, because this looks worse than your classic bags under eyes. Independently, Downey makes a mental note to get Constantin good sleep pills. Constantin already has several mental notes on this matter, most of them consider finding a discreet therapist.

The young man excuses himself from the table early, having barely touched the food. He just hasn't the appetite. His thoughts lead him to the cherry part of the orchard. Perhaps a walk can clear his head. It doesn't help much, but it helps, pacing between the trees focusing only on his steps. In more places than not the roots of the cherry-trees are poking out from the mint-plagued grass. In some places they were crating arches big enough for Constantin to slip his forearm thorough them. Gradual erosion of the soil, Constantin thinks, sometimes creates very interesting marvels.

'Your cousin has gone mad,' someone says behind him.

Internally, Constantin curses, because he hasn't been paying attention and let someone to sneak upon him. He doesn't let it show, though. He turns around to face Downey's amused expression. He says: 'Oh, what has he done this time?'

'He's baking mad.' the explanation was offered with a shrug. 'Chased me out of the kitchen, unless I, and now I quote, want to be baked into a pie. I suppose he is taking this teacher meeting a bit toos seriously.'

'Schools should be taken seriously.'

Constantin is asked if he isn't being a bit hypocritical.

'I've never said I shouldn't take it seriously. I should. The thing is that I don't.' He grins and scales up the nearby tree. It isn't much of a challenge to climb it to the nearby top. Downey's hands are faster and stronger, though. When you are an Assassin, everything is a competition.

They are sitting in the tree side by side, shoulder on shoulder, because there isn't enough space on the only one solid branch. Constantin has too many elbows and they are everywhere, mainly in the man's rib cage.

Vetinari thinks: _This is weird. And also fun._

'Can I ask you something, Doctor?'

He has to remind himself that students and pupils were (and occasionally still are) considered targets for knives for calling Downey a Lord. 'Sure.'

'How could you marry your wife when you didn't love her?'

Vetinari thinks about the answer. They approached a close enough topic with Downey not so long ago. What was it he said? 'We just found it easier to face the world together rather than each alone. Plus, I was tired of waiting at the time,' he says slowly.

Constantin is silent for a long while. He says Madam wants me to marry.

_Oh. Damn. Damn, damn, damn._

'To the daughter of Lord di Yardi in Genua. I don't even know her.'

_Well... Fuck._

The boy hides his face in hands. Vetinari is quite sure that if he isn't crying, he is about to any moment. 'It's just not _fair!_ '

There is a sound of a distant thunderstorm approaching Basketville very fast. A sigh. 'Life is not fair. Feel free to do something about it.'

۞۩═════۩۞

There is a house of a certain reputation on the Edgeway Road they call Madam July's. It's a expensive looking brothel where the rich folks go to when they are feeling like doing something lewd and cheap, and the less fortunate but certainly not poor visit when they are feeling very expensive and refined. The house is second-hand silk and frilling velvet, wood imitating marble, Klatchian pillows on Agatean floors with Djellybabian decorations, thick history books bound in cheap red leather laughed at by historians, steel polished to shine like silver. It is a place which is trying too hard to be rich, refined, expensive and oriental. What amazes the Morporkian workers and brings them to their knees, draws a snobbish smirk of the Ankhian aristocrates – one are given a luxury which they can, much to their amazement, afford, the other are left assured they are still the top of the world. Madam July Mendahorse knows her customers.

There are bets going on that Madam July is to become the next head of the Seamstresses' Guild. As the house, such the Madam. She wears sober rich blacks and shiny steel. If you aren't very familiar with the Assassins, you could mistake her for one with ease. Rumour has it that she has disposed of a few very bothersome clients in a very de Chacal manner. No proofs, of course, but have you seen her rings? They surely can hold enough poison to kill this entire street.

As a matter of fact, Madam July hasn't any experience with poison, besides vast amounts of alcohol, or weapons. Of course, as a working woman, she can round some squares as a street worker, but she is getting her years, and in heels and tight dress it isn't exactly an easy task.

She has only one very expensive and very quality dress, all rich deep black and heavy velvet, and she has worn them exactly one time, back when she was simply July to everyone. Although her figure hasn't changed almost at all, she hadn't worked up the courage to put on such a true finery on her ever again. And when she finally did, it would ruin her cheap aesthetic.

Less experienced members of the Guild often wonder how a woman of such a look as Madam July get into her position. Madam July isn't pretty; tall, thin, all bones, flat is the Disc, a face bit too sharp, her blue eyes a bit too piercing. If they gather the courage to ask her, Madam July replies: 'It's all about the exotic accent, girl. The accent.'

Sometimes, after one too many glasses of wine, July wonders is her dream of becoming a famous actress hasn't come true after all.

۞۩═════۩۞

The porch is full of dogs. Even Downey had to admit that there is something like too many dogs and that it is this. The original plan was to hold the Parents and Friends of School Association meeting outside, but since it is raining like the gods were all in mourning, the plan is off the table and all the people are inside. There aren't many of them, for Downey's standards. For Basketville it is quite a large gathering. Vetinari himself is used to bigger, but they usually have a purpose, although that City Council with a purpose sounds like an oxymoron. Constantin is also used to larger gatherings, however, he is also used to avoid them like a plague.

There is Mrs. Foxglove, of course, since she is the headmaster and only teacher of the Basketville elementary school. Dr. Whatnot is a supporter of all education, and where is Whatnot, Sholmes cannot possibly not be. Although the miner-physician isn't really happy about it, as Sholmes has quite the cough. Old Captain Tramain is here too, he isn't a _parent_ , but his granddaughter attends the school, and since he takes care of her... Agate sends his regards, he couldn't make it. Broken leg is broken leg says Papermould. As he is trying to figure out where to put his tray of cookies.

Kitchen is full of baked goods. Downey is taking all school matter very seriously. Vetinari often jabs at him that if he was as resolute pupil as he was and partly still is a teacher, there would be no one better at the Academy. To which Downey always replies that if he was such a resolute pupil and student, he'd be dead for thirty-odd years by now.

The kitchen is also full of people and those people are talking. Vetinari, to his very own surprise, doesn't mind it that much. He strikes a conversation with Tramain. The captain is very similar to Commander Vimes, but more angry and more tired. Instead of law he speaks war and he considers it very stupid indeed. Vetinari cannot but agree.

Mrs. Foxglove is such a darling as she is always. The people make her visibly nervous but also very excited. Vetinari makes a mental note to visit the woman from time to time just so. She seems very lonely person. Or perhaps it would be even better to get another woman of Foxglove's age to Basketville, ladies love to keep company to each other, as far as his knowledge goes. His knowledge of women come mainly from his aunt, Sybil, and Margolotta, and he doubts that the three of them are a good and standard example of femininity. He should talk about this with Downey someday. Downey was good with people.

He politely declines another cup of tea and glances around. The detective and the doctor have been talking to each other most of the time, mainly about each other and their plans for the evening. A few years back he would have interrupted them just so eh would stop being envious of them being such a quiet domestic couple. Today it makes him wonder where, for Hell's sake, is Downey. With a quick excuse, There's been a bit too much tea, he goes to look for him. He isn't outside, not even on the porch. Not in the bedroom, bathroom and herbarium. He knocks on Constantin's door in the attic.

'Have you seen D- Vetinari?' He has to remind himself to use his own name. So far he's been successful in avoiding any names at all.

Constantin looks up from his engraving and moves the magnifying glass from his face. What exactly is he doing to that plate of metal is a mystery to anyone but him. 'No, I haven't. Have you checked the library?' Vetinari hasn't, but then, why would be Downey in the library?

Downey is in the library, reading a book on early post-Tacitus Genuan history and economy, snuggled in a blanket and a cup of cold tea next to him. Vetinari finds anything related to Genua utterly boring, but he has come to the conclusion that is its because it was pressed on him in his early years all the time.

'What are you doing here, dear?' He adds the dear only when he looks around to make sure no one else is listening. Basketville is an accepting place, but you have to keep it low. As far as Vetinari's knowledge goes, and his knowledge goes to the Rim and back, there is only one couple on the queer side besides them. And that couple is Sholmes and Whatnot, as Downey keeps on reminding him, so maybe it doesn't count.

Downey turns page but not his head to him. 'What does it look like?'

Vetinari scoots next to him on the shezlong, a more comfortable and younger cousin of the one in the living room, because unlike the living room, the library is actually used in this household. He snuggles under the blanket. You seem to be reading the dullest book on Disc, he says and adds that for Blind Io's mercy, Downey is cold. 'But I meant what are you doing _here_.'

The book is closed. 'There are people and it's draining. My head hurts.'

Vetinari sighs. There is a long and bit of an awkward silence. They have found out that a lot of their conversations are made of awkward silence. They don't mind, really. It's less awkward and more comfortable when you realize that you _don't have to_ talk about things all the time. Downey has said once that it is the companionship not the conversation what really matters to him. Vetinari has responded It's because you aren't one for words.

But there has been a lot of truth to Downey's words. For Vetinari, conversation is a mean of communication, not a way to spend time. He didn't realize it until young Mr. de Worde pointed it out, indirectly, as was the journalist's way, six years ago: 'Your public statements are long and public speeches short.'

This... chit-chatting would be much easier if he had any desire to actually spend time with people. Which, as a matter of fact, he's never had, because in Downey's own words, people are draining.

Except... Now they aren't, Vetinari realizes. He's spent a couple of hours in a kitchen full of people, although there aren't that many of them only the kitchen is quite small, who jabber all over the place about everything and nothing at the same time. And he's been doing that as well and it's a great time. And he isn't feeling tired at all.

Speaking about the people, somebody should go and check they haven't poisoned themselves by raiding the pantry and admiring a flower from close distance. Downey doesn't seem to be keen on getting up from his book anytime soon...

Vetinari gets up and kisses Downey in hair. 'Alright, I am going back down to make sure they aren't going to set anything on fire. Show up at some point, though, would you?'

'Yea, will do.' Downey smiles, and Vetinari realizes it's actually a very nice smile. He thinks he should do it more often, smiling. He kisses him in hair and tells him to drink the tea, because it is important to drink enough.

When he returns to the kitchen, hot with people and completely out of breathable air, he notices with a chuckle that the two dwarves are holding hands under the table.

'I'll open the window. Otherwise we are going to suffocate here,' says Foxglove and everyone agrees with her. Outside dogs howl into the rain, but nobody pays it any attention.

۞۩═════۩۞

Rosa. Rosa Linnah. That is separately, with double N and an H at the end of the Linnah. Rosa Linnah Stilltoe. Not pretty enough to be married off for her charm, with too many older sister to sweep a man off his feet by her dowry. Not good enough with her embroideries, not light enough on her feet in the ballroom, too many trips down the flight of stairs when the bloody cursed crinoline got into her way. Too proud family to let her keep cooking. Cooking is considered a working class activity, Rosa Linnah with double _N_ and an _H_ at the end.

Rosa was patient. But she was also bored easily, because she had nothing much to do. When her _papa_ clicked his tongue and said With all this books you are reading one would think we ought to give you off to a school, she replied: 'That sounds like an excellent idea.'

Rosa was brave. The Assassins' Academy was the best school in Ankh-Morpork, maybe even in the whole Sto Plains. They didn't accept girls, of course, but that wasn't something a haircut and a well written and even more eloquent faked doctor's pardon from PE couldn't fix. Not like young Stilltoe cared about that much.

Ross Liam Stilltoe didn't make any secret of him being Rosa Linnah and how the name was supposed to be spelled. He had the patience to stab things over and over thousands of times, the audacity to kick out in an elegant spin mid-walk, the dexterity to bounce and roll in fall and out of reach. He loved spending time in the laboratory, mixing and boiling and distilling all those complex lethal substances into even more complex and more lethal substances, and _those_ into even more complex and even more lethal substances. Whenever confronted about his hair which he grew out long again, or round face, or chubby hips or strangely bulged shirt, the colourful paint on face or nails or even the very uncontroversial style of clothing which allowed for indeed very free movement of legs, Stilltoe's answer was always: 'Ah, and what are you going to do about it?'

With the first year of post-graduate people stopped asking or even addressing the problem. There were different problems, the ranks of Assassins were thinning and every man counted, no matter what he wore and what he looked like.

There was hysterical and a slightly nihilistic wave of euphoria among the students, at least the surviving ones. 'You get to live this life only once and it's too short not to do what you want to do with it,' Stilltoe proclaimed in the middle of the school yard while his classmates stared at the bloodied rags of the once-beautiful wedding dress he was wearing. Every single of Rosa Linnah's sisters got married in it and the fabric has seen its fair share wear, tear and raid of the City Watch.

The signed to the Opera as guest ballet dancers and wrote poetry of varying quality on various media – Ludo chose paper and wrote mostly triolets while Stilltoe preferred sonnets on the bathroom stalls. The pinned a white rose to their lapels, living, felt, paper, it didn't matter. They loved and they hated, they fought and they struggled, and they died. Oh, how they died, six feet above the ground, ink-stained and pale.

That was years ago. When Marie Belle Stilltoe was to go to her new school for the first time, he mother gave her three roses and instruction: One is for Professor Martin, other is for Lord Downey, the third one you leave on the windowsill in the library where the poetry books are.

۞۩═════۩۞

The rain has stopped some time ago. Downey is outside checking the damage the torrential element has done to the roses, because he has worked himself to the bone for those stabby murderfuckers and he would see them grow healthy into their terrible sweet scent spreading crème blossoms, gods help him!

Constantin has crawled out of his room to the kitchen, snatched the half-full bag of candies and now he is devouring them while sobbing violently. Vetinari retreats. He isn't paid enough for that.

His retreat is to the library. After all, he has sacrificed his own bedroom for it, and now has to share a bed with Downey. Not like he is complaining, it's a big soft bed and Downey is having his perks as well, but he deserves to complain and complain he will!

There is still the blanket on the shezlong, but Vetinari doesn't feel cold. Actually, now when he thinks about it in the past few days it's been exceptionally warm. He haven't felt his hands (Downey's hands? Their hands?) being cold at all, which was not a completely new, but certainly a very rarely felt sensation.

The blanket is folded into a lump, serving him as a pillow, as he makes himself comfortable with a thin book of poetry. He opens it at a random page. The paper whispers.

T **hi** s i **s n** o **w** a _ll_ of **m** y **w** _it_ :

 _to_ **lo** ve **lo** ud tu _rm_ **o** i **l o** f _th_ e **fi** ght,

 _to_ pe **n** e **t** ra _te_ gi **rl** s **'** _d_ r _e_ a **m** s **in ni** ght,

 _to_ **be** _in_ **deb** t a _littl_ **e b** _it_ ,

 _to_ **whi** s _t_ _l_ e as **m** y **m** _out_ **h i** s shap _ed_ ,

 _to_ **w** ash a **w** ay **w** o **rr** y **wi** _th_ **win** e,

 _to_ s **qu** an _de_ r fast t **hi** s life of **min** e,

 _to_ gai **n n** _ot_ **hin** g, sa **m** e _to_ forfeit.

Vetinari stares the the line, his head empty of all thoughts and words. His eyes keep watching the lines over and over without them starting to make any sense. The words slur together, as thought the book is drunk. Or maybe Vetinari is drunk, but he knows he isn't. He tilts head to side, which sort of helps, but not much.

He ruffles thorough the pages until he realizes he is only getting a headache without any actual reading. It isn't even worth the effort and now he has his mood totally spoiled. With letters swimming all over the page, not much reading can be done.

With the book still in hand, he returns to the kitchen, where Constantin is still weeping profoundly over his broken heart. It's getting king of bothersome. Vetinari thinks about telling the boy about that one time he was in a serious risk of marrying Sybil, but from the position of Downey, which he is pretending to occupy, it would sound quite odd.

Instead he taps Constantin's head with the thin book of anarchistic poetry 'Hey, read this. I think you'll find it quite your style.'

Constantin looks up. He has his hair literally everywhere. There is a caramel swirl stuck to his forehead, how ti got there should probably remain a mystery. Vetinari flicks the candy off. Constantin says: 'Ow.'

And then, because _somebody_ has to be a responsible adult, Vetinari adds, Drink at least a glass of water, Constantin, don't you know the dehydration is the real killer. As it happens, Constantin knows that dehydration is the real killer, thank you, Doctor.

Considering his job done here, Vetinari heads for the bathroom. There is something calming about the mundane teeth brushing and a very short and cold bath. Vetinari doesn't feel like heating up the water and he has never felt like it, really, it seems to much of work for twenty minutes of quickly fleeting warmth. The only exceptions when he has the nerves to put up with it is winter, because everything is freezing enough already. On the other hand, living with Downey under one roof has proved itself useful in this regard, among many others, because the man is probably planning to boil himself alive one day. Which means that once he leaves the tube, Vetinari can sink into still very warm if a bit used water.

They have tried to take a bath together on more than one occasion. The romantic idea has been, however, completely spoiled every time by the fact that Vetinari is too many limbs and Downey too many muscles. They have both agreed that all the mopping isn't simply worth it.

Later, with his hair still slightly damp, he goes to the bedroom, because it is getting late and today has been exhausting. People are always exhausting. On his way he notices Constantin in the kitchen, sleeping on the table. The young man has three quarters of his face buried in the book and the remaining quarter in candy.

Vetinari thinks for a while. He takes Constantin into arms. His cousin gives a jolt, but doesn't wake up, because his day has also been exhausting, given that he has spent majority of it crying. Vetinari carries him two flights of stairs and rests him on his bed.

He'd like to think it's something his father would have done, but he doesn't remember his father much. All he can recall is a tall figure of dark hair, a soothing voice, and a pinch too much imagination. He doesn't miss him, because you can miss only something you had. Old Lord Vetinari was a very distant person. But sometimes he allows himself to wonder, like now for example, what would it be like, having a father. A proper family, not Madam Roberta and a lot of aunts calling him a big boy when he was four.

He wonders about Constantin's father for a while. That man had had a tragic and fatal accident a few months after Constantin was born. Vetinari attended to the funeral. Madam was truly striking in the black mourning dress. Although, more than half of the wailing bereaved were more smitten by the price rather than the beauty.

It's getting fairly late, the light outside is fading, the sun nowhere to be seen. There are dogs scattered thorough the house like piles of clothes discarded in the haste of love. Only piles of clothes don't snore. And if they _do_ snore, there is something _very_ wrong indeed. Especially Emma looks completely exhausted. Vetinari thinks that the dogs are owed a good bath, they remind more of bog beasts rather than dogs. Well, that is Downey's problem, isn't it?

Speaking of Downey, he hears the man in the bathroom. He has never seen or hear a man to brush his teeth with such a vigour as Downey does. He has seen quite a few set of teeth as pristine as Downey's, but those all belonged to vampires.

He thinks about sneaking in and making a comment, but the decides it isn't necessary or wanted. Instead he heads to their bedroom and changes into bed clothing. How can Downey wear a two piece nightwear is beyond him, but as of now it is the only that fits him. Even a better question, why is that damned thing Agatean cut?

When Downey, washed clean of dirt and roses, enters, Vetinari is already in the sheets. There has been an attempt to read, but the words keep stubbornly swimming over the page.

'Dear?' Vetinari turns over.

Downey hums and snuggles closer to him underneath the blanket. Has he really hands cold like that all the time? 'What is it, Havelock?'

A book is pressed from hands to hands. 'Read to me, would you? Just a chapter or two.'

I'll get us some candles, says Downey with a too-annoyed sigh.

۞۩═════۩۞

Stain Papermould was born in Basketville at the break of the last century, and if travelling fortune tellers are to be trusted, he will die in it and never set a foot out of it. As for the dying part, so far they've been right. Stain's mother was a teacher and his father was a teacher. His brothers and sisters were teachers, his children are teachers and his grandchildren will be teachers one day.

Stain isn't a teacher. Bad injury in childhood, terrible lisp. Teacher's need to be understood and Papermould cannot say a word without lisp and stutter. He prefers to communicate thorough letters. He has a beautiful cursive, that kind you get when you train it your whole life to be read by little children.

He has school in his blood. There wasn't anywhere else he could go to. In the end, he became the janitor of the Basketville school. If the children had a little knack for a mystery, they'd be saying he knows all secrets of the old school. That the building has entrusted him with them, as he cannot tell them to anyone. The children would say that Stain Papermould is a priest of a long forgotten god in whose temple the school was built hundreds and hundreds years ago. That he can open the locks which have lost their keys, and lock those which cannot be locked.

They would say that he hears the stones whispering the knowledge repeated thousand times within the walls. That the bats from the attic fly as he pleases. That the peonies in the front yard bloom a little brighter when he walks by.

They'd say that he doesn't need anything but chalk to sustain him. That he can walk thorough the black slates from room to room like ordinary men can walk thorough the door. That his broom doesn't sweep the floor for anyone else.

Sadly, children nowadays believe more in logic and modal verbs and late modern Klatchian history rather than mysterious janitors. And so the slates are kept crystal clean and chalks disappear without questions.

۞۩═════۩۞

Downey wakes up in the middle of the night, which isn't a thing that happens to him often, ever since he has retired. He is cold. Freezing. He mumbles something very unpleasant on the account of the temperature and snuggles closer to Vetinari. The response is: 'Do I look like central heating to you?'

For a moment, Downey is shocked that Vetinari speaks to him in D major flat, but then he remembers the reasons. It doesn't make him feel better, but at least calms him enough to gather himself for a snaky You certainly feel like one. Followed by Why aren't you sleeping?

'Why aren't you?'

'I'm cold,' Downey explains. He is cold enough to feel awake. Great, now he isn't falling asleep for long time. Just what he wanted... Vetinari probably feels the same, because he turns his head around to face him. Oh man, is he heading for a two-in-the-bloody-morning conversation?

'Have you... ever been with someone before me?'

'Havelock, maybe it have slipped your mind,' he says in the tone letting know everyone listening he knows Vetinari is bloody well aware of the fact, or maybe simply ignoring it, 'but I used to be married for twenty-seven years.'

There is a silence. 'You know what I mean.'

Downey says that no, he doesn't. I don't see into your head, 'Lock, and yes I am aware it is my head, I don't see into it either, one would think that based on my entire life, you would have figured that one out, don't try to be a smartass.

Vetinari sighs and snuggles a bit closer, careful not to get impaled on some kind of a pointy bone. 'Have you ever _loved_ anyone before me?'

If anyone else asked him this, Downey would assume it a trick question meant to cause an argument. But this is Vetinari. One of the few people he actually trusts. Perhaps the only man whom he trusts fully and unconditionally. He deserves honesty if nothing else. He says: 'No, I don't think so.'

'You _think_ so?'

'Don't quirk the eyebrow at me, it looks stupid on this face. I've tried.' He gets a nudge into ribs for dodging the question and also, Downey how do you know I'm doing that. 'I just know.'

'Look, Havelock, my life's been a mess. It still sort of is. I consider myself lucky that I have my socks sorted out –'

'You don't, they are a mess.'

'– somewhat sorted out. You remember how I was back in my student years. I've slept around. When you were away, hell broke out and being with someone, anyone really, was an escape. I cannot say that I didn't wish some of those companionships had lasted, because that'd be a lie. But,' he takes a long shaky breath, because he's spilled that all out in one go, 'I don't know if any of those were love. And if it was, then not like you.'

They are silent for a long while. Downey is stealing warmth, Vetinari stillness.

'I've loved Margolotta.'

'I literally did not ask.'

'I think that you should know it anyway. Maybe I still love her.

'Yes, well, I don't care.'

Vetinari questions that statement, hows and whys and buts spill out of him like gut from a butchered sheep – hot and nearly burning, red with blood and ugly. This needs to stop.

'I've loved you for long. Not always did I know it, I admit, and it has resulted in a lot of things I regret. I was prepared to go my entire life without any of this,' he makes a vague gesture into the night. 'The house, the orchard, the garden. Being with you. Sharing bed. If you had asked me three years ago about my future, this isn't what I'd have told you. But I have it and I am grateful for it. At the end of the day, you've chosen to be with me, of all people. And that is more than I have ever hoped for. If you ever decide you want to leave, I'll let you. What kind of love would it be if it was to make you unhappy? Of course,' he rolls on his backs, 'I wish you don't decide for that, ever. Selfish, but that's how it is with me.'

It takes a while for Vetinari to digest all of that. 'This was uncharacteristically well composed and striking at the heart of the matter for you,' he concludes finally.

'Thanks, I've been rehearsing that for the past two years.'

'You also don't tell me that you love me much often. Downey, why don't you ever tell me you love me?'

Downey chuckles. 'Why would I tell you something you damn well know?'

'Hmm.. To feed my ego a bit?'

'Oh, as if you needed that.' Downey elbows him a bit. Now when he has such excellent elbows for elbowing people, he should make use of them at least a little bit. 'If ego was a currency, you could fund three independent nations with it.'

Vetinari doesn't say anything to that, he only grins. It's a bit unsettling grin.

'Please, don't write to that golden bastard that he should convert the dollar to ego.'

You're no fun, Vetinari answers.

Well excuse him, Downey returns, but he's just gotten himself out of politics and stupid financial books and teaching and he has no desire to slide this slippery slope again, thank you very much. The the cheerful sound disappears as he says: 'Hmm...'

'What?'

'We really ought to do something about Constantin. Or more like his insufferable ginger boy.'

'You mean Twinkle-Clement-Monger?'

'Yeah, but nobody calls him that,' Downey waves hand. He is right, nobody except Vetinari calls Twinklemon Twinkle-Clement-Monger. Everyone says usually Twinklemon or You Ginger Bastard or some derivative of the aforementioned. It has to be said that Downey feels a kindred spirit in the boy – out loud, consumed by his work in the laboratory. Somebody should keep an eye on him, it would kill two flies in one snap if it was Constantin.

Vetinari asks what Downey thinks that should be done with them, given that Constantin is supposed to marry young Lady di Yardi.

'On the top of my head: We could marry those two together faster.'

'Dows, I hate to break it to you, but same sex marriage is not legal in this country.'

'Well, and whose fucking fault is that?'

'Don't poke me with the elbows, it quite hurts, you know?'

'And you don't change the topic. And stop hogging the blanket, I am cold. Oh you little –' Not much later they both end up on the floor, cheery and laughing, hair tangled. Downey feels the hurting leg but doesn't care. Vetinari doesn't feel the insensitive hand, despite it is being held quite tightly, and he also doesn't care.

They catch their breath. It sounds like a very short sentence, but it fails to cover the moments when they burst right back into boyish giggling and make stupid faces, trying to look serious while the corners of their mouths are still attempting to laugh. More than once they both thing they have it, breath almost calm, and then one of the remembers something like Downey who got the nightshirt pulled over his heat and was tangled in it so tightly that he had to flail the pillows at blind, mauling the wall in good belief it is his beloved enemy, so one cannot help but laugh and the other one doesn't even need to know what is he laughing at, he simply joins.

They go back to the bed. Both the men both are cold, so they lay there in each other's arms.

'Dows?

Are you seriously trying to start another conversation about my deep feelings or something like that, Downey grumbles.

'Just one last question, I promise. Because it bugs me.'

Downey knows how it is when something bugs Vetinari, that man would be kept awake by it for hours, making himself an annoyance. Bigger annoyance than usually, that is. 'If it gives peace to your soul. Shoot.'

'You seriously have to _think_ you've never loved anyone like me? As in, you don't know for sure?'

A heavy, heavy sigh. 'She happened to be tall and lean, black haired, and could speak with Genuean accent. I am nearly one hundred percent sure that I didn't love _her.'_

۞۩═════۩۞

Richard Littlegood had three sons. The oldest, Agreed, was of course meant to inherit the butchery after his father. Deal, the middle one, was supposed to make a career and break the expectations, so he became an apothecary at the barber-surgeon. Eventually, _his_ son got a scholarship at the Assassins' Academy and nowadays is the head of their infirmary. Had Richard Littlegood lived up to see it, he would be as proud as ashamed. Still, there was young Offer and his father didn't know what to do with him. He was expecting a daughter and what was the traditional way to deal with a third son puzzled him.

In the end, he decided that as long as Offer decides for a solid, reliable business, it would be okay. Offer Littlegood expressed his desire to be an engraver, because combined his father's wishes as well as his own fascination with writing. The Engravers' Guild has considered their business all dealing with ink since the dawn of time.

Young Littlegood was _exceptionally_ good with his chisel. His true passion and chosen research was, however, the permanent imprinting of ink into vellum. 'Some of the books at the Unseen University,' he would have told you, had you asked, 'are over thousand years old. Being used as they are, you would think the ink faded beyond recognition, but it isn't! It has been sewed into the vellum, making it possible to survive as long as the leather itself does.'

Had he lived long enough to see the printing press, his admiration of this machine would know no ends, because as his field of research was mostly empty, Offer Littlegood became a bit of an inventor in his own way, recreating, improving and improvising vellum-imprinting machinery. In spite of having major portion of his free time consumed by inks and needles, he still used to meet his brothers very often and listen about their work. As he had himself pointed out: 'It is never too late to learn something, and I am certain I can use the knowledge of my brothers in my work.'

Offer Littlegood is the only known engraver to ever work directly at the Palace.

۞۩═════۩۞

Friday morning finds the three Assassins at the table, Constantin lazily chewing thorough the breakfast, Vetinari going thorough Downey's correspondence pretending he knows exactly who all the people writing to him are, and Downey scribbling in and around the crossword in the morning _Times_ and pretending to be solving it. Both the older man find playing the role of the other one utterly frustrating, but aren't saying anything about it.

'Who, for Io's three left eyes, describes safflower as a dye?' Downey mumbles. He is low key proud of himself for knowing the alternate spelling. Who knew that nearly forty years of botany experience would be _this_ useful?

Constantin ponders whether anyone would mind if he ate the last butter biscuit. They are good with coffee. Butter biscuits are always good, but they tend to be a bit, well, dry on their own. He comes to the conclusion nobody is going to mind, so he munches it like a squirrel. To his left, Vetinari chuckles and quickly makes it seem he is amused by the letters and not his young cousin.

Instead, Vetinari asks: 'So, what are your plans once the break is over?'

The boy seems to be a it relieved. He says that this is something he actually wanted to address, but makes it clear he hasn't got the courage to start himself. 'I have a thesis to write. I was able to do her a number of experiments, –' Downey here mumbles something about the poor cherry trees, '– but I still have a lot of literature to consult and I haven't found it here. I... thought that I'd return tot he Guild earlier to continue my work.'

'Admirable dedication.'

Downey sticks the pencil into the black ponytail into which he's pacified the hair for today, closes _The Times_ and asks , When are you planning to leave then.

Constantin focuses on his half eaten biscuit and nearly cold coffee full of buttery crumbs. 'Um... Today?'

The men exchange looks. Vetinari downs the rest of his coffee like the tired City watch Sergeants after two sets of both day and night shifts finish they whiskey.

'Do me a favour, try not to break the mug,' is spoken from behind the once again opened _Times_. 'And you, young man, unless you want to get the afternoon train, you should better be packing.'

And really, once Constantin finishes his soggy crumbles with a coffee after-taste, he goes up and packs. It doesn't take him long, because most of the packing was already done yesterday. Vetinari makes use of his, well actually Downey's, strength and helps him with the baggage.

The two of them venture downhill to the train station, chattering about the quality of various wood and why is walnut better than oak. Downey is leaning on the gate, watching their back as they disappear behind Sholmes's beehives as the road curves around them. He doesn't bother waving and they in turn do not bother looking back.

Then Downey goes back inside, carefully erases every word he wrote into the crossword with the following exceptions: safflower, mignonette, decamp. After a moment of thought, decamp is considered unworthy of making it into the crossword and is scrubbed off the page.

He goes thorough the letters, because they are _his_ letters after all. It stung as Vetinari was reading them, because Downey has always held a firm belief in the privacy of correspondence. But there are things you have to sacrifice for a bit of theatre meant to preserve one's dignity. Or the dignity of two, when we are at it. Although Downey now isn't really the dignity is really worth it. Having his letters read made him feel like he was sixteen again – meek and desperate to hide himself and everything that was his, to conceal everything that hinted any softness or vulnerability. Downey had learned to be vulnerable in his late years and it took a lot of work and confidence.

He's never read anyone's letters. Or diaries for that matter.

The letters are the usual, but Downey enjoys them all the same. Although, he admits that Stilltoe didn't really have to draw hearts all over the paper. Oh wait, it's from Ms. Stilltoe. That makes it less creepy, but still... He sighs. 'Maybe Stilltoe and I ought to have a word.' Then he thinks that the less he speaks to Ms. Stilltoe, the better. It could spiral somewhere inconvenient.

Vetinari returns just as Downey is folding the letters and putting them back into their respective envelopes.

'You wouldn't believe who's arriving tomorrow.'

Downey tilts head to side and thinks for a moment. 'The Duchess of Borogavia?'

Vetinari says No, she's been dead for some time, darling, try to keep up, and Downey replies that being dead is no excuse, just look at Mr. Slant. Vetinari pouts, he'd rather not to, he has eaten, thank you very much.

'But you weren't too far with the Duchess, though. Except she is of Ankh and coming with her husband.'

Downey drops the letters. The paper floods the floorboards with the sound of of a whispering book. 'You don't mean _here_ here, right?' he asks for a clarification while he is collecting his precious correspondence.

For a moment Vetinari has to think whether the man is serious or not. 'The Wickerworker's Manor is a perfect condition to live in.' That seems to bring a wave of relief, and so he continues: 'Of course, knowing Sybil and the Commander, they'll probably want to drop by and see us.'

Downey goes straight back to ashes, and collapses on the chair. 'A correction of your statement: They want to see _you_.' He makes a sweeping motion towards the face he's been unwillingly lent this week. 'This isn't something I could handle.'

Vetinari gives him a look saying that he doubts that.

'I'm serious. Look, fooling Constantin isn't that hard, his experience with the two of us is fairly limited. But Vimes? And if not Vimes, Ram- his wife is going to notice for sure.'

Didn't you want to be an actor, Vetinari asks. Downey spits out thorough gritted teeth that yes, an opera actor and singer, back when he was thirteen, what do you want from me, sing them a serenade? Vetinari says, Please don't.

What Downey doesn't say: I don't want Vimes here. This place was supposed to be safe and I do not want to spend even a day on my toes, freezing with every sudden movement. I don't care if anyone recognizes that I am not you. I don't want Vimes here. Instead he says: 'It's nice of them to drop by to see you.' And he means it.

Vetinari thinks that being able to feel on multiple levels is a beautiful gift. He doesn't say that, of course. He thinks about the things he doesn't say and about the things which Downey doesn't say. He thinks about it still as Downey leaves the room, I'll check on the bees, I'm outside if you need me.

He thinks about silence as he sits down with the crossword bearing marks of the eraser, a sight so painful to his eyes. He thinks silence as he nibbles the end of the pencil, and the words don't come to him. It seems unlikely that _zany_ would be intersecting _chantry_ at _N._ At _Y_ it would make sense, but at _N_ it is plain dumb. Nobody would possibly make such a pretty word like _zany_ or a fragile delicate _chantry_ do such an ugly thing. Vetinari is looking at the empty squares without seeing them. The house is quiet. No, not quiet. Devoid of sound.

Vetinari thinks, and it is like catching rainwater in sieve – the thoughts aren't solid enough to let themselves be captured like that, they cannot be looked at because they are transparent. They can be felt, smelled, tasted, but not examined by eye. He thinks Downey's thoughts and those aren't made from words you could march into lines of sentences and formations of paragraphs to inspect them.

Silence, he thinks. Silence is a language. A mean of communication between two individuals who understand each other. How had Downey put it; lack of eloquence could be can be considered a virtue, those were the words, weren't they?

The pencil and The Times are both put down on the table. For a while Vetinari is simply looking outside of the window, questioning what exactly it is he sees there. Eventually it stops being interesting, so he gets up to see if Downey needs any help with the bees.

Outside in the orchard, the one solitary apricot among her cherry and apple sisters shyly breaks open the very first blossom into bloom.

۞۩═════۩۞

The Assassins' Academy, known as the De Chacal Academy prior to _official_ existence of the Guild, is full of sons, and lately also daughters, of dead Assassins. Majority of the Guild consists of young people and pupils, as neither Lord Winder nor Lord Snapcase held them in high regards and thinned the numbers of the Guild to mere decades.

The Meserole family, that is to say Madam Roberta Meserole has been much the opposite – always very fond of the Guild. When her son hit the sweet pre-teen years, she sent him to the Academy, despite his protests and poor health. However, Constantin's respiratory problems, soon fled in the face of the Ankh-Morpork air, which was the cure-or-kill medicine to all lungs in the world. Not that his mother needed to know that, as long as he had an excuse to avoid any and all social gatherings in Genua, Constantin would with a clean conscience claim he turns into an ugly toad after the curfew.

When he was younger, he found it a bit amusing and mildly annoying when Madam, he's never called her mother, addressed him as Havelock. However, the very obvious resemblance between him and the Patrician caused a lot of awkwardness in school. It went so far that it got Lus Twinklemon into the infirmary for one whole afternoon. As it happened, they boy took the broken nose as a friendly gesture and gave Constantin a sight seeing tour thorough the Shades, and Constantin hadn't found a way to get rid of him. Not that he was searching for it.

Grown out hair obscuring face and the ugliest glasses, which he claims to be prescription although it isn't true, have saved him a lot of questions like 'Are you and Vetinari related?'A question he hated, because the answer was 'yes' and it pushed the expectations in being like his older cousin in everything.

Constantin revolts wherever he can. Instead of political science studies ballistics. He doesn't talk to people. He isn't in the centre of things. His his grades are average at best. He had to retake the Stealth and Concealment class, because he failed the final test. Twice. There is the whole chess club incident which shouldn't be mentioned. He wears his hair longer than the rules allow. His clothes are black light enough to be a very dark grey, and lack any style or shape. To avoid any family connection, he insists on being referred to as Mr. Constantin. Lus Twinklemon doesn't really count, Constantin would be doing that anyway.

For some strange reason, Professor Mericet and Doctor Downey, who is actually Lord, but you don't call him that unless you like to have things thrown at yourself in class, find it absolutely hilarious. Whatever, if it amuses them... As long as nobody calls him Vetinari, Constantin is fine.

۞۩═════۩۞

The following morning, Vetinari gets up early. He hasn't got much of a choice there, because one of the not-Emily dogs (Edward, probably) noses him out of the bed. Big pack-human, the pack requires food, you do food. As he makes his way to the kitchen

The dogs still haven't realized that their master and Vetinari have switched positions, but it is very hardly noticeable. Downey doesn't really command them, and they don't really need commanding. Vetinari, elbows deep in livers, grated carrots and oatmeals, quietly wonders, how such a big forces of destruction can be so calm. Wuffles used to shred whatever he came upon.

Downey is still sound asleep when the dogs are fed, which is no surprise, because in the night they both stayed up late. Vetinari has decided to cope with his difficulties with focus on reading by forcing Downey to read to him. It is actually a very nice practice, the only trouble was the logistic of the bodies. Too many pointy shoulders.

Just to have something to do, he decides for a bath, he needs to wash of the stench of the liver anyway. For some reason, Vetinari feels the time pressing on him. He doesn't bother with heating the water, because that isn't worth the effort. He regrets it a bit when he sinks in and there is goose-flesh all over his body. It is soon forgotten is he scrubs himself clean with a brush, which sends the blood flowing. It is soon reminded to him again as he uses the thinning brick of soap, because for bloody Offler's sake, Downey, this thing is nearly pure menthol! What is it with you and mint?

On the other hand, menthol is cold only the first few minutes. By the time Vetinari is getting out of the bath, he feels as if his skin was on fire. What the hell is wrong with you, Downey? Besides being still asleep, of course. Vetinari let's him sleep, the man deserves that. How long did they stay up anyway? Until one in the morning at least. Probably much later than that.

The clock in the living room where no one lives move slowly towards quarter to ten. Vetinari makes himself tea and a small breakfast and decides to use the living room. It needs some dusting before he can sit down on the shezlong which has the comfort quality of a rock. It is like sitting on needles. He checks the room three times, because he doesn't feel alone. Too vulnerable. Too exposed. Just to make himself feel more at ease, he goes to the bedroom and puts a knife into each sleeve. The weight is remeasuring, calming, familial feeling.

He sits there, sips the tea, studies the slightly awful yet deeply intriguing cubic-floral patter on the wallpaper, all while the clock keep ticking. The shezlong could have been made of needles, Vetinari can't keep still. The ticking irritates him and he cannot put his finger on why is that. There is this irrational dread which it inspires and it fills his head like wet lumpy cotton. Just as there is a rapt knock on the front door, he realizes what it is – the ticking is simply too regular. The knocking continues and the clock shows it is ten o'clock in the morning, flat.

The tea is put down on the kitchen table and Vetinari heads for the door. It opens with a quiet creaking noise. His first thought is: We need to oil it tomorrow or maybe better today. His second thought is: Freeze.

In the door is standing Vimes. Vetinari suddenly completely understands what muscle memory is, because the body simply refuses to move. Don't move, it says, they go after movement. IF you don't move, you are not interesting, probably dead. Don't move. Don't breathe.

He manages to smile. Oh, this is probably why Downey has such a crooked smile every time he talks to Vimes, he thinks. 'Good morning, Commander. I must say that I am very surprised to see you here, we expected you in the afternoon, but the surprise is pleasant.'

Vimes growls something about the morning being fine and something about Her Grace coming later because of something with Young Sam. When your brain is half frozen, there are many somethings in whatever information people give you.

'Well, come in. Make yourself at home.' Thawing. Knees nearly giving out. The key word here being _nearly_.

Vimes, who for once is out of his uniform and managed to sneak out of Wickerworker's Manor in a plain shirt without any ruffles and as such cannot be considered the Commander nor His Grace, enters the hall and then lounges around the kitchen.

'Would you like a cup – '

'No.' It is a very resolute statement. And a harsh one. Vetinari's legs, which remember being much too well what it is like to be Downey's legs, are all for a diving jump out of the window. But the window is closed and Vetinari isn't feeling like having a talk with the Basketville's only glazier. So instead he says, I beg your pardon what have I done to deserve this harsh treatment.

Vimes crosses arms. 'I'm not going to take a thing from you, you bloody poison-boiling bastard.'

That is a two-level offence; one because it is aimed at Vetinari, two because it is actually aimed at Downey and Vetinari isn't going to let anyone spit dirt at Downey. Not without a proper reason anyway. Downey wouldn't poison anyone just so. Not to cause anything serious at least.

There are words which escalate into fists and kicks very soon. Vetinari has enough sense not to draw the knives, although he really wants to. He is confused, how could it escalate so fast? Then he hits the cupboard with the back of his head, there is a sharp snapping pain behind his ear and somebody says: 'Ughh.' It was probably him, because it sounded like Downey.

The next thing he knows, he is in a bed. His head hurts like mother of all hangovers, which he has experienced only a few times. Eyelids are too heavy. He is cold. Despite all of that he sits up, he regrets that very soon, and looks around. It is the master bedroom.

As Vetinari rolls out of the bed to find out what has just happened, his leg shoots a jolt of pain. The embrace of the floorboards is hard and Emma snuffs his hair to make herself sure everything is fine. It takes some time for him to sit back up. He is wearing his nightshirt. And come to think of it...

'Oh hell. Downey is going to be pissed,' he mumbles as he gathers himself up from the floor and limps to the dresser to put some decent clothes on. It feels good to have his body back, although he can't say he missed the wounded leg much. Or the freezing hands.

Once in at least a vaguely humanoid shape, he enters the kitchen. Downey is sitting at the table with a soaked dishcloth at the back of his head. Vimes is sitting on the opposite side, looking very ashamed, like a dog that has accidentally bit the feeding hand instead of the bone. There is a steaming cup of tea in front of him.

Without even looking up, Downey growls: 'Just so you know, Havelock, this one is competing for the third worst morning in my life.'

'My apologies. Good morning, Your Grace, by the way.'

'Morning, sir.'

There is a very awkward silence, which isn't silence at all, because Downey is groaning all the time, as he is touching about and around his head. Then he concludes he most likely hasn't a concussion, Havelock be so kind and handle your Commander, I am going back to bed.

'He isn't my Commander,' Vetinari tells him as Downey is heading out of the door. Vimes laughs at that and it sounds like he means it.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Feed me comments. Please. Feed me comments, dear reader, for I am famished nearly to grave.


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